Stevens: Ginsburg 'doesn't need my advice' on whether to retire

By Jennifer Epstein

04/20/14 10:23 AM EDT

Former Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens believes justices should think about their potential successors when weighing whether to retire from the high court, even though he didn’t when deciding to step down.

It’s “certainly [a] natural and appropriate thing to think about your successor,” Stevens said in an interview that aired Sunday on ABC’s “This Week.” “You have to have an interest in who’s going to fill your shoes.”

Asked what he’d advise Ruth Bader Ginsburg — who, at 81, is under pressure to step down under a Democratic president and Democratic Senate — Stevens didn’t show his hand. “I’d say she doesn’t need my advice, she really doesn’t,” he said.

Ginsburg did ask for his advice when she became a more senior associate justice following his retirement in 2010, and he expressed the same sentiment. “Basically, I gave her that.”

And, Stevens said, his own retirement decision was not at all about the political persuasions of his potential successor.

“My decision was not made for any political reason whatsoever; it was my concern about my own health,” he said.